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Goatorade
Famous around campus, Goatorade is WPI's official sports drink. It is known for having two main varieties, one high in caffeine for late night study sessions and one high in electrolytes to refresh athletes fresh off the field. The drinks lack of wide spread appeal in the New England market is tied to various controversies that limit it to the campus. The drink was first invented in the early fifties during a campus push to increase the competitive side of school athletics and while it gained a cult school following, University of Florida had a similar idea and was much more successful marketing their drink, forcing Goatorade into obsolescence until a recent revitalization of the brand that proved unsuccessful for entirely different reasons. The 2013 Goatorade rebranding was an initial success but suffered long-term due to the drinks popularity corresponding to a Connecticut out-brake of goat-born HIV virus that stole headlines away from the fledgling drink. Facing disappointing sales, the drink distributer backed out of the contract leaving a very limited supply lying around campus. History Goatorade has a long and fairly distinct history both on and outside of WPI's campus. Athletes at WPI complained of reduced performance due to poor hydration during the '52 season with track athletes complaining the most about how poorly they where feeling by the end of a long rep. The teams were heard by post graduate health researchers Richard Singer and Harry Londosy who set out to develop a way to keep athletes better hydrated. First they looked at recent medical advancements in the disposable syringe industry to see if shots of electrolytes and caffeine would increase performance, but the costs long term both financial and mental proved troubling. They jumped to more extreme measures after tasting their mixture and realizing how poorly it tasted. The researchers realized that minor fruit flavoring would augment the salty taste without using sweeteners. It was at this point that caffeine was dropped from the blend. At this point after several months of production the drink was distributed as a mix added to water jugs to WPI athletes during sporting events with no branding of product identification. Athletes performed better during the '53 and '54 seasons. In 1954 WPI's football team managed to go completely undefeated for the second time ever. The drink continued to gain wide appeal throughout the end of the decade with little developments to the branding or recipe. In 1962, the school attempted to get outside distribution rights but the inventors of the drink fought heavily for their own high royalties. The school was forced to drop the subject, with assumption that a college athletically branded energy drink would never have found it's market. In 1965, a team of researchers at University of Florida lead by Dr. Robert Cade developed a similar product later called Gatorade. Whether it was independent or not is a widely debated concept as Londosy and Singer had seen little success in their respective research careers and may have been disillusioned enough to share the idea with UF. WPI faculty voted not to pursue legal action against University of Florida because they were worried about bad PR and decided to avoid any legal action taken against them to completely remove branding from the drink and continue only using it in house at practices and games. As Gatorade gained popularity, the much better tasting Goatorade was phased out even at WPI. Goatorade faced a brief revitalization in the 1980s with a rebrand that featured the two distinct flavors known around campus today. The flavors represent WPI's motto of Theory and Pactice. The Theory has much more caffeine and a sweeter taste while the Practice is much healthier and aimed at quenching thirst. The revitalization was short lived as the drink still failed to find wide appeal. The most recent attempt to bring Goatorade back came in 2013, when Singer, the last of its original researchers, died and gave the rights to market the drink back to the school which had been long awaiting the reading of Singer's will. During a three week campus competition many logos were put forward over a lot of fanfare with Racheal Meyer of the Class of 2014's submission winning overall. The drink was hugely popular that season at WPI giving the campus the confidence to reach out to local distributors and market the drink in Western Massachusetts. Unfortunately in what has now become campus legend this marketing move corresponded with a Goat-born HIV outbreak in nearby Connecticut resulting in boycotts of goat related products and a health scare. Many people from Northern Connecticut saw the advertisements for Goatorade and thought they were pranks directed towards northern farms. The distributor tried feverishly to dump remaining stock in the drink and cut ties with WPI. But they were unable to sever ties well enough before their home offices outside of Worcester were attacked with goat feces and horribly vandalized. The company soon went out of business completely. This set of events often called Gompei's Darkest also resulted in the loss of WPI's "''Goat for it!" ''due to the possibly offensive and sexual interpretation.